Chapter 416: Could Someone Be Calling for Help Below?

When Zhang Xingyu woke up, he found a crowd of people watching him.

It made him feel embarrassed.

As a youth of the new era, his dream was much like that of other otaku: sleep until he naturally woke up, and play games until his hands cramped.

Unfortunately, the smart NPCs in the game lacked a sense of public morality.

Just sleeping and getting up—does it have to be so entertaining?

"Zhang Xingyu, the wooden boat is missing," Feng Qingyu said anxiously as he saw him open his eyes.

"If it's gone, it's gone," Zhang Xingyu replied displeased.

These smart NPCs were really pedantic; it's just a minor game prop, worth only a few copper coins, yet they insisted on disturbing his peaceful dream over it.

"Junior Brother Wei rowed the wooden boat away," Feng Qingyu added.

"If he rows it away, let him," Zhang Xingyu yawned, then felt refreshed. "It's just the lowest‑grade canoe. Since Senior Brother Wei likes it, let him have it."

He saw Feng Qingyu, Gu Yunyao, and the other disciples of Heaven's Edge Pavilion still staring at him with surprised faces, and couldn't help finding it amusing.

It was just the lowest‑grade broken wooden boat, yet those NPCs treated it like a treasure.

He stood up, bowed to the crowd, and said, "As the saying goes, the old must go for the new to arrive. In a moment, I, the young master, will spend 100,000 spiritual stones to buy a higher‑grade black awning boat from the Great System."

"Who is the Great System?" someone asked.

Zhang Xingyu was too lazy to explain. He infused his spiritual consciousness into his storage ring. In a corner of the ring lay a pile of glittering spiritual stones—no fewer than 100,000 in number, all appearing to be high‑grade spiritual stones.

With so many high‑grade spiritual stones, buying one black awning boat was trivial, let alone ten.

So he withdrew his spiritual consciousness, chuckled, and said, "Open the system equipment trading interface."

"Ding‑dong." The equipment trading interface did not open, but a system black diamond emerged from deep within the Divine Court.

"Host, have you gone crazy? Where did that system equipment trading interface come from? Do you think you're playing a game?"

"Isn't it?"

"No."

Zhang Xingyu was stunned on the spot.

Damn, so I wasn't actually playing a game.

If it's not a game, then the NPCs around me must be real people. Or perhaps real people are cosplaying.

But if it's not a game, what the heck was that system just now?

Zhang Xingyu's face flushed red then turned pale, then red again, his eyes bulging like bells.

Seeing Zhang Xingyu's expression, the quick‑witted Feng Qingyu naturally guessed a few things.

"Zhang Xingyu, Junior Brother Wei rowed the canoe away. What shall we do now?"

Since some unspecified time, as the big sister of Heaven's Edge Pavilion, she had become accustomed to seeking Zhang Xingyu's opinion.

"How would I know? If nothing works, we'll just have a cold dish."

Zhang Xingyu muttered, then angrily walked to the lake shore and cupped water to wash his face.

This is so damn humiliating. Damn Wei Xiang, why steal anything, especially my canoe?

The ice‑cold lake water splashed onto his burning face, like drinking an ice‑cold beer while eating hot pot, instantly quenching the spark of heat inside him.

Zhang Xingyu lowered his head and saw his reflection in the water. The young master's face was still like "a jade tree in the wind surpassing Pan An, a single pear blossom outweighing the crabapple"—in a word, handsome.

At that moment, strings of thumb‑sized transparent bubbles rose from the lake bottom. As soon as they reached the surface, they burst one after another, emitting a series of crisp popping sounds.

Zhang Xingyu was stunned on the spot.

The crisp sounds had a clear rhythm, strong and weak in succession; together they formed a Morse code pattern of three short, three long, three short.

SOS? Could someone be calling for help below?

No way?

After a while, another string of bubbles rose from the lake bottom, bursting with the same three short, three long, three short rhythm.

Is it a coincidence? Or is there really someone trapped below?

"Xingyu, what are you thinking?"

Before he knew it, Tang Yunxi had already come to his side.

"I want to look beneath the lake," he said, turning to Tang Yunxi.

"Okay. Then I'll go with you," Tang Yunxi said without objection.

"You stay here and wait for me. In case there's danger below…"

"Zhang Xingyu, you promised you'd never abandon me."

"Uh…"

The most unbearable is a beauty's kindness; the hardest to refuse is a beauty's affection.

Splash!

Zhang Xingyu and Tang Yunxi clasped hands and leapt into the lake.

The disciples of Heaven's Edge Pavilion stared at each other in bewilderment.

Disciple A: "Suicide hand‑in‑hand?"

Disciple B: "A double tragic love?"

Feng Qingyu, with a disappointed face, said, "Is this despair? What about the promise not to give up, not to abandon?"

Gu Yunyao, eyes watery, asked, "Zhang Xingyu, why is this?"

The lake water was crystal clear and bone‑chillingly cold.

Zhang Xingyu and Tang Yunxi interlocked their fingers and descended slowly.

Schools of fish swam around them, seaweed swayed beneath their feet, and occasionally a shark flashed its teeth overhead.

None of those phenomena occurred.

The two of them descended underground without incident for over a thousand meters and smoothly reached the lake bottom.

At the lake bottom, broken gold bricks lay scattered in all directions. These gold bricks were palm‑sized, their surfaces engraved with strange characters. Perhaps because of great age, most of the runes on the bricks had already faded.

Bypassing the scattered gold bricks, the two arrived before a tightly sealed archway.

The archway stood about ten meters high and five meters wide; the dark‑gold door panels were carved with a pair of playing mandarin ducks, and on the blank space to the right of the ducks a line of odd script was etched.

Staring at the odd script for a while, Zhang Xingyu could not recognize a single character.

He turned his head toward Tang Yunxi.

Fairy Tang Yunxi, the Celestial Emperor's daughter, was presumably learned and exceptionally talented.

Then, he saw Tang Yunxi's slightly furrowed elegant brows.

Tang Yunxi gently shook her head: "Don't look at me; I don't recognize these characters either. But judging by their shape, they should be the divine race script from the ancient age."

"The divine race script from the ancient age?"

"Yes. Legend says that in the ancient age, when heaven and earth first opened, a batch of powerful beings were born in this world. They created humanity, created all things, and also created writing. These beings were respectfully called gods by the human race."

"What happened later? Where did those gods go? Does this world still have a divine race?"

Tang Yunxi shook her head again: "The ancient gods have long ceased to exist; they may have left this world or already perished. One hundred thousand years ago, the celestial and demonic races jointly attacked the divine realm, and the remaining descendants of the gods in this world were wiped out as well."

Since the script was divine, this place was likely a relic of the divine race. And behind this great gate, perhaps lay the treasure left by the divine race.

Thinking of the divine treasure, Zhang Xingyu's curiosity flared.

He was about to get rich, to get rich big.

He pushed with both hands, exerting his strength.

The gate did not budge a hair.

Again.

This time, he used twelve times his strength.

The gate still remained motionless.

This gate was indeed sturdy. Could it be that brute force wouldn't work and a secret phrase was needed?

"Sesame, sesame, open the door!"

"What are you doing?" Tang Yunxi asked curiously.

"I'm using a secret phrase! To open this door, it probably requires a secret phrase."

"A secret phrase?"

"Yes, a secret phrase!"

Hearing that, Tang Yunxi also began to fire up her clever little brain.

After a moment, she offered her suggestion: "Each of these two doors has a mandarin duck carved on it, one female and one male. The left door's carving is likely a line of poetry; if a secret phrase is needed, then a line of poetry must also be carved on the right door."

That made sense. Following that line of thought, the next step was to decipher the text on the left door.

The characters on the door, I don't recognize, and Fairy Tang Yunxi doesn't recognize either.

What to do? For internal matters, ask "Da Niang"; for external matters, ask "Gu Gou". If only there were a translation tool from Da Niang or Gu Gou right now.

No Da Niang, no Gu Gou, so we can only consult the omnipotent System.

"System, System, calling System!"